


Who Cried Wolf

by PenPatronusAooO



Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Bromance, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Father Figures, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Hurt Spencer Reid, Hurt/Comfort, Kidnapping, Male Friendship, PenPatronus, PenPatronusAooO, Team as Family, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-25
Updated: 2016-02-25
Packaged: 2018-05-23 06:08:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,306
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6107487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PenPatronusAooO/pseuds/PenPatronusAooO
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Every night a photoshopped pic of Spencer Reid bruised, bleeding, & broken is sent to Hotch, Morgan, JJ, Garcia, & Rossi. It happens so often that eventually the team stops panicking about it. It's when they let their guard down that Reid goes missing, & the next image is REAL.</p><p>STORY COMPLETE!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Who Cried Wolf

**Author's Note:**

> Reid & Hotch father/son relationship, Reid & Morgan bromance. Originally published on FanFiction.net.

Aaron Hotchner buckled the apartment door with one vicious kick. "FBI!" he bellowed, bursting into the living room with gun and flashlight drawn.

A body wrapped burrito-tight in blankets rolled off the couch with a startled yelp. It bumped the corner of a chess board on its way down, catapulting black and white pawns through the air. Floppy brown hair preceded wide, blinking brown eyes. "I s-surrender," the half-awake Spencer Reid stuttered. The doctor ran his tongue across his lips and squinted up at the light. "Hotch?"

A police captain sent his force through the apartment while Aaron waved at the paramedics to follow him. Gun sheathed and flashlight trembling, Hotch knelt beside Reid and started wrestling him out of the blankets. "Where are you hurt?" he demanded. "Reid, talk to me! What happened?"

"What do you mean?" Spencer tried to shrug off the blankets but kept getting in the way of Hotch's clawing fingers. Finally, he just held still and let the SSA strip away the afghan, the cotton blanket, and even his robe. Hotch grabbed handfuls of Reid's gray sweatpants and white t-shirt, twisting the fabric left and right like he was looking for something. "Hotch, what are you doing? I'm fine!"

One by one the lights went on as the police officers cleared each room. The captain shut the curtains tight across the windows. "Reid!" Derek Morgan entered the room like a tornado. Stray papers on desks and bookshelves went sailing in the wind. He rushed to Hotch's side and together the two men lifted Reid up onto his bare feet. "Oh my God," Morgan exhaled after he looked the young doctor up and down. "God, Reid, you're alive."

Fed up with the unanswered questions, Reid planted his palms against his coworkers' chests and shouted, "What the hell is going on?"

Hotchner and Morgan exchanged glances. Both men sucked air like they'd just run a marathon. "You got one, too?" Morgan asked.

"Yeah. Phone?"

"Phone."

"Reid, I thought you were…" Hotch suddenly crouched into a catcher's position and braced himself against the couch with both hands. "It looked real. The rug and the blood—"

The broken door had swung halfway shut when a new boot hit it. Rossi and JJ ran into the scene equally sweaty and out of breath. A sound part hiccup, part sob erupted from JJ. "Spence!" Before he could get a word out she flew into his arms, practically choking him with a hug.

Rossi gripped Hotch's shoulder with his right hand and held up his smartphone with his left. "I take it somebody sent you the photo, too?"

Hotchner stood up, unlocked his cell phone and checked the time tagged to the photo message. "Got mine at 3 am."

Morgan checked his. "3 am on the dot," he reported.

Spencer squinted over JJ's shoulder. "Is that…me?" he asked when he spotted the image on Morgan's phone.

The "Doctor Who" theme suddenly squealed from the couch. Spencer plucked his phone from between the couch cushions and read the name of the incoming caller. His lips pressed tight and he glanced up at the others before answering. "Garcia, I'm alive—" Garcia's shouts were so loud that Spencer had to hold the phone away from his ear.

Rossi and Hotch held their phones side by side. "I recognized it," Hotch said, pointing at the red and brown rug in the photo and the same one in the center of Reid's living room.

"Those are the same clothes he wore at work yesterday." Rossi gestured to the navy vest over a white button-down shirt. "Don't remember the blood, though."

"That's sophisticated photoshopping," said JJ. She blinked her eyes rapidly to remove the water hovering in them. "The light is right for this room. Even has the shadow the table would cast if the overhead light was on."

"The blood is the right color, too." Morgan swallowed before speaking again. "That pool under his head wound is dark and the slashes on his arms are bright red."

"Garcia, it's 3:15 in the morning, don't go into work!" Reid said into his phone. He was about to argue some more when Hotch plucked it out of his hand.

"I'll be there in twenty, Garcia. I want the bastard's name by dawn, you hear me?" With a final nod, Hotch canceled the phone call.

"Why would somebody want the five of us to think that Reid is dead?" JJ wondered.

"It's most likely a threat," Rossi hypothesized. "The unsub is showing what he'll do to Reid if he doesn't get what he wants."

Reid winced when he took a closer look at the image on Morgan's screen. "Am I missing a thumb?" Morgan scowled, shut the screen off and pocketed the device.

"Did any of you get a second message? Or text with the first?"

"Just the picture." JJ took a steadying breath. "I was sleeping. I heard my phone buzz and I rolled over and… God, I really thought you were dead," she whispered to Spencer.

He offered a kind smile and held up both hands to show that all of his fingers were attached. "I'm ok."

"And we're going to keep you that way." Hotch released the EMTs and, with Spencer's permission, ordered the police to search the apartment for any sign of a break-in or a camera. "Morgan, JJ, escort Reid to the BAU." Without another word, Hotch marched into the hallway and disappeared down the stairs.

Spencer rubbed his arms and stifled a yawn. "Really freaked out, isn't he?"

"He cares about you. We all do. You know that," said Rossi.

Morgan snorted. "How would you feel if a picture of his dead body appeared on your phone in the middle of the night?"

Spencer shuddered. "Guess I'll get dressed."

Morgan's eyes followed Spencer like a hawk as the younger man went into the bathroom. JJ wiped away the rest of the moisture on her face and followed Rossi to help the police officers. When he was left standing alone in the middle of Reid's living room, Morgan whispered to whoever might be listening, "If you hurt him, if you even touch him, I will eliminate you."

\------------------------------------

When noon came, the team gathered in silence at the round table. All eyes were on Garcia as she pointed the remote at the view screen, lowered it, and then pointed it again. After a deep, steadying breath, the blonde gripped the hem of her siren-red skirt and hit the button. The picture appeared. The picture of Spencer Reid lying on his living room floor. Blood coated his left temple, the collar of his white shirt, and pooled beneath his disheveled hair. Numerous scrapes, bruises, and burns stood out on the visible skin of his arms, hands, and neck. Sightless, spark-less eyes stared at nothing.

Garcia cleared her throat. "The photo forensic gurus and I dissected every pixel of this picture," she reported. "We have determined that it is a composite of at least eight digital images." Garcia pinched another button and the image zoomed in. "Although it can't be seen by the naked eye," she said, pointing at a section of the rug beside the body, "there are micro…m-micro…"

Reid reached her just in time and Garcia vomited into a trashcan instead of on her nude pumps. "I'm sorry," she told the group when her stomach was empty. "I'm so sorry. Just—just give me a minute." Morgan rolled a chair over while JJ got some water. Reid helped her sit down and kept a hand on her shoulder until the dry heaves subsided. "Well, that was…unprofessional," Garcia sighed once she'd rinsed her mouth out, straightened her clothes, and regained her composure. "It's just that I've been staring at that photo all day and more than once I forgot that it wasn't real and—"

Spencer knelt down and gathered Garcia's pale, petite hands in his warm, large palms. "Thank you," he said.

"For what?" she sniffed.

He smiled. "For loving me so much." Reid leaned in and placed a dry kiss on her cheek. And then he stood and addressed the group while staring directly at Hotch. "All of you." Attention back on Garcia, he said, "I'm going to sit beside you this whole meeting, all right? If you forget that I'm all right, even for a second, just take my hand."

Garcia nodded. "I can do that." She picked up the remote, brandishing it like a sword. "Ok," she said through a fierce exhale. "Long story short, peeps, is that we found zero messages embedded in the picture. No text, no numbers, no symbols…"

\------------------------------------

Only six people had his new number, so Morgan was extra surprised when his phone chimed at 3 am. Exactly 24 hours after someone sent him a gruesome picture of his best friend dead, a second one arrived.

He beat the police to the apartment by thirty seconds and the paramedics by sixty. Reid's door was replaced with a reinforced version complete with double padlocks. Derek slammed his fists against it for the longest 30 seconds of his life before it swung inward. Reid stood in his pajamas with his bangs in his eyes. "What?" he mumbled, and Morgan thought it was the dumbest thing he'd ever heard his genius friend say.

When Hotch and Rossi arrived two minutes later the first responders were filing out. Reid and Morgan sat on the couch staring at a smartphone. "The body's repositioned but it's the same image," Spencer was saying. "The same rug, same clothes. The unsub didn't take a new picture of me today so that might mean he isn't stalking me."

"I see at least four more wounds," said Morgan. "Looks like your left arm is broken. Two fingers are missing."

"More blood," Rossi chimed in. He patted his chest and said primarily to himself, "Same heart attack."

Hotch nudged the resurrected chess board aside and sat on the edge of the table. "Reid, when the agents escorted you home—"

"I didn't see anything out of the ordinary," Reid assured him.

"I want someone to stay here with you tomorrow night."

"Is that really—"

"Yes, it's necessary!" Hotch snapped. He winced and hung his head when the other three recoiled from his tone of voice. "Morgan, do you mind?"

"Hotch, I'm flying out the day after tomorrow," Reid reminded him.

Rossi steepled his fingers. "Reid…"

"My mother is expecting me!"

"Then we'll find the sick bastard before then," Morgan declared. He held up his phone like it was a trump card. "We changed our numbers and the unsub still found us within hours. That narrows the profile."

"The systems at the FBI have been tracing incoming messages to our phones all night," Rossi mentioned. "We might have the answer right when we walk into the BAU."

"Or we might have nothing and I'll see you guys at 3 am tomorrow." If Reid's words were visible they would've been dripping sarcasm.

Hotch suddenly stood. "I have to…" he muttered. "Jack…" Stiff, robotic, he left the room.

\------------------------------------

Night #3: Hotch and one police officer reached Spencer's door at 3:07 am. Morgan stood at the threshold, holding the door open for them like they were all guests at a dinner party. Reid, still in his work clothes, was pacing the room and chatting on his phone with Rossi. Garcia called Morgan a second later, and JJ called Hotch.

The police officer rolled his eyes, grumbled something about an interrupted game of Candy Crush, and sulked back down the stairs.

Spencer spent night #4 on Morgan's couch. Hotch, who was part of the FBI patrol guarding the house, knocked on the front door at 2:55 am. The three men sat on the couch, stared at their phones, and waited for 3:00. Right on schedule, the fourth picture appeared. Four fingers were missing. Same clothes, same rug, different splatters of blood and…

There was no head on Spencer's body.

Six hours after picture #5 appeared, Spencer received a phone call from his mother at work. "I have to take this," he apologized to the group gathered at the round table. "She doesn't understand why I can't visit."

Garcia turned off the view screen and everyone relaxed when the five photos of Reid's dead body disappeared. "If this is a devious plan to keep us all from getting enough sleep, it's working!" Morgan said after a massive yawn.

"My heart can't take much more of this," JJ said, clutching her blouse. "Are we any closer to figuring out who's sending them?"

"I'm more concerned about what's going to happen when we get to zero," Rossi said.

"What do you mean?" Garcia asked.

"In the first picture he was missing one finger, in the second he was missing two," Rossi explained. "Five, five. That's part of the unsub's pattern."

Hotch sat up straight in his chair and intertwined his fingers on the table. "You think it's a countdown."

"The question is, what's going to happen after picture #10?"

\------------------------------------

After picture #8, Hotch ordered Reid into the BAU conference room, placed a 24/7 guard just outside the door, and doubled the security in the entire building. The whole team stayed over the night that #10 was due. They ate pizza, played poker, and did their best to forget that at 3 am Reid's dead body would appear on their phones. Nobody argued when Spencer pointed out that they weren't actually there to keep him company, it was more about their need to physically see that he was all right when the countdown ended. For his part, he didn't argue when the five couches and futons just happened to be arranged in a tight circle around him, as if Reid was a campfire and the others were just trying to keep warm.

It was JJ who rolled out of her sleeping bag when Reid began to talk in his sleep. She ignored the whispers at first, even though it was obvious that he was having a nightmare. His eyebrows danced in the dim light cast by the various surveillance cameras and charging laptops nearby. Eventually the strained noises evolved into words. "Gideon," Reid whispered. Hotch and Morgan's heads popped out of their sleeping bags like Meer cats from their holes. "Gideon, help," Reid begged, louder.

"Spence?" JJ knelt on the floor in front of Reid's couch, propped her chin on the cushion, and gently cupped his cheek. Instantly she recoiled as if stung. "Spence, you're burning up!" she cried. The others rose. Rossi turned on the lights. "I think he has a fever," JJ reported.

Hotch pressed the back of his hand against Reid's neck, cheek, and forehead. "Reid, wake up," Hotch said in a gentle tone of voice normally reserved for Jack. "Get some water," he told Morgan.

"I'll find some Tylenol," said Garcia.

Reid stirred when Hotch spoke his name again. "Is it 3 already?" he slurred.

Hotch patted his back. "Sit up for me." Reid obeyed. He didn't fight back when Hotch scooted him over so that he could sit at his side.

JJ tapped his kneecap. "Reid, you—"

"I'm not sick," Reid announced.

JJ rolled her eyes. "I was going to say that you were having a nightmare."

"It's a wonder we're not all coming down with something," Rossi pointed out. "The way we've all been sleeping makes us pretty damn susceptible."

Spencer blurred his s's into z's when he spoke. "It is super-hot in here." Shrugging off his sweater seemed to tire him out, so Hotch lent a hand.

"Drink," JJ ordered when Garcia handed her the pills and Morgan a bottle of cold water.

"JJ, I'm—"

"Don't make me use my mommy voice!" she growled.

Reid snorted. "You just did."

Hotch frowned. His jaw looked even more iron than usual. "He might need to get checked out," he said to Rossi, "but I don't want him leaving this building."

Rossi shrugged. "We could get a doctor here, but…"

"I don't want to risk the unsub sneaking in with paramedics."

"Exactly."

It happened then. Right on time. Five cellphones buzzed and chimed. "Here we go," Reid sighed. Rossi, Garcia, JJ and Morgan ignored their beeps, choosing instead to stare at the carpet. Hotch took a deep breath and slid his phone out of his front pocket. It clicked under his thumb. His lips parted and his cheeks paled when the new image popped up.

"Hotch?" JJ interpreted the anxious body language first. She couldn't imagine any image more disturbing than the ones they'd already received, but she asked the question anyway. "Is it—is it worse?"

"It's, uh…" Hotch coughed twice. "It's different. The unsub broke his pattern."

Morgan folded his arms against his chest. "A different body? Somebody else?"

"No. Um. It's Reid. And it's the same rug. Similar injuries. Fingers are back to ten. But…" Hotch turned to Reid. "Your arm. Left sleeve. Show me."

Fuzzy with both fever and sleep deprivation, it took Reid an extra tenth of a second to comprehend what Hotch was asking. He shrugged off his blanket. On the inside of his left elbow, clearly visible on the white cotton of his button-down shirt, was a half-moon shaped coffee stain. Before Hotch could ask the next question, Reid said, "I bumped the cup when we were in the middle of that second Texas Hold'em game. 10:15 tonight."

"Don't say it," Rossi groaned.

"The unsub used a new picture of Reid." Hotch held his phone up for everyone to see. Gasps echoed off the walls like ricocheting bullets. "A picture that was taken today."

"He got it some point in the last five hours," JJ clarified.

"He got it from here," Hotch snarled.

"Oh, God," Garcia whispered.

Morgan started jogging around the room disabling every camera he could reach. "Son of a bitch."

Reid rubbed his eyes with a thumb and forefinger. "At least this narrows the profile," he murmured. "Our unsub's skillset is getting more specific."

"There's something else," Hotch said. "He broke another pattern." Garcia crossed her fingers and held them high above her head. "It's hard to see on such a small screen but I'm certain there are letters across Reid's face. I don't know what it means…"

"What does it say?" Rossi asked. "Spit it out."

Hotch met every pair of eyes in the room except for Reid's. "Wolf."

\------------------------------------

Four more days—four more pictures, four more missing fingers, four more instances of "Wolf" typed across Spencer's dead eyes—passed before the team got their first break.

Morgan got to work first and discovered that Reid had shoved all of the furniture in the conference room against the walls. Thousands of crime scene photos littered the floor. Men and women, children and adults, victims of stabbings and gunshots and all manner of awful things humans do to each other. Reid sat Indian-style in the center, surrounded by 14 blown-up pictures of his own mutilated body. He was setting a crime scene photo of a brutally beaten teenage girl alongside one of his own when Morgan said, "You look better."

Startled, Reid fumbled for his gun before he realized it was Morgan. 

"Antibiotics worked," he said when his heart stopped pounding.

"And what's all this?"

Reid grinned. "I figured something out."

JJ gagged when she walked into the room half an hour later and saw the pictures taped to the white board. "Spence, seriously, do we really need to see them?"

Reid's eyebrows jumped. "I blurred my face," he said, gesturing at the red pixels in each photo. "And my socks!"

Garcia sat with her back to the board. "We can still tell it's you," she whined. "We know it's you!"

"It's not Reid," Hotch reminded them when he entered the room with Rossi. "They're just pictures. Keep repeating that. What did you find?"

Reid loosened his blue tie, rolled up his blue sleeves and took a deep breath. "Garcia said that the unsub is making composite photographs, meaning that he's combining several into one. That got me thinking that he has to be getting the other pictures from somewhere, and if they're pictures of wounds and beheadings, then they must be crime scene photos."

"So you started looking through our recent cases?" JJ figured.

"Yes, which got me nowhere, so I went back five years, then 10, then 20, and then…" Reid taped a faded, blurry picture beside the very first one of himself sent 14 days before. "And then I found this."

The 40-year-old man in the photo lay spread-eagled on his back. Blood had pooled beneath his head, and his arms were slashed up. Burns and bruises dotted his neck, arms, and hands. Rossi sat up straight in his chair. "That's one of the first cases Jason and I worked on!"

"The body position mirrors yours exactly," Hotch noted.

Morgan counted the wounds twice. "So do the injuries."

"I'm still not looking," Garcia muttered.

JJ spoke Spencer-quick. "You're saying that this is part of the composite. The unsub replaced the victim's body with yours!"

"Bingo," Reid said, tapping the side of his nose. He picked up another photo. Although it was a female in her twenties, the body position and the injuries perfectly matched the second picture of Reid. Same with the third, a boy no older than five and the fourth, a woman around age 50. One by one, Reid lined up the matching photos until all 14 fit. "And the common denominator is…?" Reid flourished his hands like a magician.

"Gideon." Garcia's curiosity got the better of her, and she'd pivoted in her seat. "Gideon was the lead agent on every case!"

"I remember the beheaded victim," Rossi said. He interlaced his fingers and rested his chin on them. "Terrible case. His own brother was the murderer."

"But what about the fingers?" Morgan asked. "Some of them show damage, but there aren't any missing."

Reid shrugged. He eased his hands into his pants pockets and sat down next to Hotch. "If the countdown theory is still correct, that might mean he's counting down the days until he takes another picture of me."

"Or it's a form of self-control," Rossi theorized. "He's forcing himself to wait ten days. The countdown is for him, not us."

"Or it could be a red herring."

"Too many 'or's," Hotch sighed. The agent suddenly put his arm around Spencer's shoulders. "Sorry," he apologized when the younger man started. "Seeing you helps, but…"

Morgan abruptly mirrored the gesture on Reid's left. "He's right. I know you're ok, kid, but I might have to, uh, pinch you once in a while."

"Review time, team," said Hotch. "What do we know about this guy?"

JJ took the cue. She grabbed a marker and started writing on the board. "He has a picture of Reid's living room floor, so at some point he got into his apartment. He's skilled at photo manipulation and managed to access BAU crime scene photos, specifically Gideon's cases. Every night he sends a photo to the five of us at precisely 3 am. It doesn't matter how often we change our numbers or our phones, he still tracks us down, and always manages to block the incoming number. He's used two photos of Reid—one taken 14 days ago, the other four days ago. Spence could've gotten his picture taken at any time that first day, but we know for sure he was here the second time, which means that the unsub hacked into our cameras. The only way he deviates from the body positions of the victims is a missing finger corresponding with each day. And our only other clue is the word 'Wolf.'"

"Is that a name associated with any of the cases?" Hotch asked Reid. The young doctor shook his head 'no.'

Morgan tapped his thumb anxiously against the table. "Maybe it's a street? The name of a bar? Somewhere a victim was discovered?"

A cell phone buzzed. Spencer's, for once. Reid read the text message, pocketed his phone, opened his mouth to speak, and then abruptly retrieved his phone again. He fumbled it, sending it bouncing across the table. Garcia slapped it back like they were playing table hockey. "What is it?" Hotch asked quietly.

"It's, uh, an old friend of mine." Reid cleared his throat. "Remember that Ripper copycat case in New Orleans? I visited my friend Ethan there. He's a musician. Came to D.C. for a show. Wants to meet for dinner tonight."

"No way," both Hotch and Rossi declared. Reid didn't meet their gazes.

"Is this your friend who bailed on FBI training after one day?" Morgan asked.

"So he's a smart guy." JJ adjusted her weight in her seat and crossed her legs. "Smart enough?"

"We were, uh, pretty competitive," Spencer said softly.

"Competitive enough that he might hold a grudge?"

"He's a jazz musician!" Reid sputtered. "Our unsub's computer skills are too sophisticated to be self-taught. Plus, Ethan's a good guy. Possibly an alcoholic but a good guy. When we talked, he was concerned about me." Reid scrubbed his face with both hands. "It can't be him," he declared. "It can't be."

"Kid, you sound like you don't believe yourself," Morgan pointed out.

"It's just that…" Reid took a deep breath. He chewed on his bottom lip for a minute, and then took another slow inhale and exhale. "We had a talk about battling demons. My theory was that he quit the FBI because he didn't have time to analyze someone else's demons. And now I'm wondering if…if…"

"If those demons of his are the type who do that?" Rossi hypothesized, gesturing at the pictures on the whiteboard.

"And someone struggling with those demons wouldn't want to be surrounded by FBI agents who can spot them." Hotch pressed the speed dial on his cell and marched out of the room, on a mission.

"Coincidence!" Reid called after him. "Circumstantial!"

"Not taking any chances!" Hotch yelled. To himself he whispered, "Not with you…"

\------------------------------------

The conference room stunk of Chinese food and beer. Hotch hesitated when he opened the door, deciding to savor the sight of his team relaxed and laughing. They were playing charades, and the two girls were beating the three men by a landslide and a half. Morgan appeared to be having some sort of seizure on the floor. Reid and Rossi shouted out guesses and, with each miss, Garcia and JJ's cackling laughs got louder. A timer buzzed. Morgan went limp with a frustrated groan. "An eel!" he shouted at his teammates. "I'm an electric eel!"

Rossi spotted Hotch and sobered. The others followed his line of sight and went quiet, too. "Well?" Reid prompted. "How'd the interrogation go?"

Hotch glanced at his phone. 2:58 am. "Ethan is…intelligent," he said. "I can see why he got accepted into the academy."

Rossi patted the open space beside him on the couch, and Hotch sat down. "You're really going to avoid the question in a room full of profilers?"

"He admitted to wanting to cause Reid physical harm after a particularly embarrassing chess tournament when they were 13."

Reid nodded. "Understandable. I beat him in six moves."

"And…?" Morgan encouraged.

"He claims to have no knowledge of the photos." Hotch checked his phone again. 2:59 am. "And I don't think he was lying."

Reid's watch suddenly beeped. He clicked it silent, then looked around the room expectantly. A minute passed in dead silence. Cell phones were whipped out of pockets and purses. 3:00 am came and went. 3:02 followed 3:01 and, still, none of the phones buzzed.

"Oh my god," Garcia whispered. Her part anxious, part excited expression matched everyone else's. "No picture means that the unsub is locked up…right? Right?"

"Maybe," Hotch allowed.

3:03.

Garcia gripped Morgan's sleeve with both hands and strangled it. "It's over," she declared. "It's really over! You got him!"

"Don't get too excited, baby girl," he warned.

3:04.

"But it's come at the same time every day for two weeks! It's him! It's Ethan!"

3:05.

Beeps, buzzes, and chimes erupted from five phones. Morgan hung his head. "Dammit!" He stood and punched the wall.

JJ put her arm around Reid's back. He leaned into her touch, then folded so that his head rested against her shoulder. "I'm sorry, Spence," she whispered to him.

"Maybe I did get my hopes up," Reid admitted.

Hotch cleared his throat and got up. "I'll go print out the photo in my office. Garcia, break out Gideon's case files so that we can find the crime scene photo that matches."

Tears sparkled in her eyes. She didn't trust her voice, and just nodded once.

Hotch was still in his office ten minutes later when Reid went to check on him. The senior agent sat at his desk with his face in his hands. The printer had spat out the photo, but Hotch had turned it upside down. He jumped slightly when Reid knocked, and the young doctor apologized for interrupting. Hotch assured him that it was ok and motioned for him to sit in the chair opposite. A minute of silence passed before Reid spoke.

"It's been a year since he died," said Spencer softly. "I barely talked to him after he left the BAU, so why do I miss him so much?"

Hotch's bottom lip quivered once—just once. "Because you thought there'd be time," he whispered. "When Gideon was alive you still had the option. The option to call him. To hear his voice. It's not just him you miss. It's the option." Hotch hesitated, then said, "And you're not the only one."

"Yeah," Spencer sniffed. "I can't help but wonder what he'd say about all this." One corner of his lips perked up. "A chess metaphor, probably."

A rare Hotchner smile preceded a snort of affection. "Or some fact about birds that may or may not be at all related."

The pair shared a brief, nearly humorless laugh. Hotch stared at Reid and didn't look away when their eyes met. "He was proud of you. So proud. You know that, right?"

"Yeah… I know… Yeah…" Reid blushed and cleared his throat. "You contacted the holding cell security, right?"

"Of course. I wouldn't count on Ethan inviting you out to dinner anytime soon."

"With the luck we've had on this case I'll be lucky if I have dinner outside of this building ever again." Reid sighed and combed his fingernails through his thick hair. "Aren't we letting the unsub win, Hotch? Isn't uprooting my entire life because of a few photographs giving him what he wants?"

"What he wants is you dead, Reid."

"We don't know that for sure," Spencer argued. Reid flipped the photo on Hotch's desk over and pointed at the three bullet wounds in his own stomach. "If this is what he wants, then why didn't he kill me the day he took that first picture? And if he really wanted to hurt me then he'd send pictures to my phone, pictures of my mother or Morgan or… or…" Spencer gestured at Hotch while glaring down at his shoes. "…you."

"You want to go home."

"I want to go home, Hotch."

Hotch waited a beat, then turned the photo facedown again. "Do you honestly think it's safe for you to go back to your normal routine?"

Spencer rested his elbows on the edge of the desk and leaned forward, forcing Hotch to meet his eyes. "With a security detail keeping an eye out at night, yes."

Hotch mirrored the body language. Spencer blinked, but he didn't. "Prove it," he dared. "Convince me with a profile."

Reid accepted the challenge with a grin. "The unsub is angry at me. No question about that. In fact, he hates me. But he's disciplined. In control. He's fighting his demons—he might even be winning." Reid stood and paced across the room, his hands dancing as he spoke, indicating the passion of a man in his element. "He probably started with scribbling out my name or drawing a stick figure or cutting up a photo of me. That made him feel better at first but the satisfaction didn't last. He didn't want to just imagine me in pain, he wanted to see it."

"But not enough to cause it," Hotch added.

Reid gave him a thumb's up. "He uses the pictures to see me dead without actually killing me. It's his coping mechanism. Ironically, the pictures are actually preventing my murder."

Hotch frowned. Every line on his face stood out. "If the pictures stop coming… that's when we should be worried."

"That would indicate that they're no longer satisfying him and he's ready to graduate to the next level. The next level probably being…" Reid used his thumb to make a slashing motion across his own throat.

Hotch stood up. He ironed his shirt down with his palms and stood in front of the window. Outside, the rest of the world was still turning. "If I promise not to kick your apartment door down unless I don't get a picture," he said, "do you agree to an around-the-clock security team?"

"Yes."

"They'll follow you not just at night but all day, too."

"I understand."

"This still doesn't explain the wolf reference, or why he's only using pictures from Gideon's cases."

"If we figure that out and it gives us a reason to suspect that I'm in more danger than we think, you can lock me up in a holding cell."

Hotch bowed his head. "All right. But if you feel like someone's watching you, if one hair stands up on the back of your neck—"

"I'll be careful," Reid swore. "Thanks, Hotch," he said before he left.

Hotch sighed. His breath fogged up the window. "Is this the right move, Gideon?" he whispered at the sky.

The sky didn't answer.

\------------------------------------

Three days later, three things happened in the first three minutes of the workday that changed everything:

1\. JJ noticed that there was one other commonality between the selected crime scene photos. Not only were they all Gideon's cases, but each was a case of fratricide or sororicide: the murder of one's brother or sister.

2\. Reid didn't show up for work.

3\. Garcia examined the most recent photo—which featured a single blow to the right temple with a blunt object—and discovered that it was real.

\------------------------------------

It was the itch that woke Reid, not the pain. The pressure the kidnapper applied to his head wound as he cleaned it hurt, but it was the itch caused by the blindfold that truly annoyed him. "If it's not too much trouble," Reid croaked, "could you scratch my left eyebrow?" The kidnapper's breaths hitched, and the pressure disappeared. Half a minute passed, and then a calloused thumb scrubbed the fine hairs above Reid's left eye. "Thank you," Reid whispered, and he meant it. Another thirty seconds later the kidnapper pressed cold plastic against his mouth. Reid lowered his bottom lip, and cold water blessed his throat. A growl from his stomach told him he was hungry. Pressure in his lower abdomen informed him that he needed to pee. According to the fuzziness behind his eyes he'd been asleep too long. He'd have a headache from that if not for the one caused by the whatever blunt object had collided with his skull.

Reid jumped at a ripping sound, but it was just a bandage leaving its packaging. The kidnapper gently applied a rectangular Band-Aid to Reid's temple. Reid sat up in his chair. It wasn't as comfortable as the one Tobias/Raphael put him in. Cold metal caused goosebumps to bloom across his skin. His ankles were tied to the chair legs, and his wrists to the armrests. Two more pairs of thick ropes kept his knees and elbows still. Reid mentally scanned his body from the tips of his toes to the crown of his head. Nothing else hurt. His clothes felt the same. When Reid was sure that he was thinking clearly, and that he could speak with some amount of confidence, he asked, "Did you kill them? The police officers guarding my apartment?"

Footsteps walked away. Reid heard clicks on a keyboard behind him, and then a genderless robotic voice said, "No. One was asleep. The other was playing Candy Crush. Do you know the story of the boy who cried wolf, Spencer?" The kidnapper started typing again before Reid could answer. "You can only cry 'wolf' so many times before people stop believing that the wolf is real. That's when he pounces."

"I'm glad you didn't hurt them," Reid said. "And thank you for stopping my head from bleeding."

Sharp knuckles slammed into Reid's cheek. Whiplash vibrated his spine as his neck twisted. The uppercut followed instantly. Reid bit his tongue and blood filled his mouth. A third hit right to his stomach pushed his breath right out. Between gasps, he demanded, "Who…are…you...?"

More footsteps. More clicks. "You're my brother."

Reid cocked his head to the side. "I don't have a sibling."

"My father called you 'son.' That makes you my brother, Spencer. Siblings know a lot about each other. Tell me. Tell me what you know about me."

"Why?"

Quicker clicks—a pause—and then a series of slow, one-fingered taps. "Profile me. Now."

"I know you're a male close to my age—plus or minus 2-5 years. I know you're right-handed. You're conflicted about hurting me. You hate me because whoever your father is, he spent more time with me than with you. You're jealous. Even though your father is dead, you're still jealous. With him gone you can't make him feel your pain, so you're giving it to me. I got the attention you should have. I know you're hurt. And I know that you're not going to kill me."

Like ripping off a Band-Aid. That's how fast the kidnapper removed the blindfold. The man leaned over him, brown eyes glaring through the thin slits of a black ski mask. 5'8" 160 pounds, Reid reckoned. Irish Spring soap. Short fingernails. Twitch in his left eye. Alcohol on his breath. Caucasian. Near-sighted. Cat-owner.

"And now?" The kidnapper's ghost of a whisper was all air. Although Reid could barely hear the voice, let alone recognize it, his mind catalogued an east coast accent. "What do you think now?"

Reid estimated that the scar on the man's left thumb was approximately ¾ of an inch long. Freckles dotted the skin but stopped where the farmer's tan did. Half a dozen flakes of dandruff stood out on his dark gray sweater. No wedding ring. Reid hung his head. "Now," he said, "I think you're going to kill me…"

The kidnapper didn't break eye contact with Reid as he reached past him and retrieved a pocket-sized, leather-bound notebook. He opened it to the first sticky note and read aloud in his breathless voice, "Spencer is the brightest kid I've ever met." Trembling fingers turned pages to sticky note number two. "I'm so proud of Spencer. Those twin girls would've died if not for his insights." Sticky note number three: "Any man would be proud to have a son like Spencer. The world's blessed to have him."

The journal flew past Reid like a Frisbee. The unsub tossed six more after it. He switched from whispers to his real voice. "Say my name."

Twin tears threatened to fall from Reid's eyes. "That won't make either of us feel better," he whispered.

"Say it."

"We would've helped you. Hotch, Rossi… If only you'd called us when you started drinking. Garcia said she saw you take a swig from a flask at the funeral. If only we'd helped you a year ago…"

A deep breath and then a bellow: "Say it!"

"Gideon," Reid squeaked. "Hello, again. Hello, Stephen."

The ski mask landed in Reid's lap. Wide and wild-eyed, Stephen Gideon held his hands out, palms up, and shrugged. "Brother," he greeted. "Like Cain and Abel, Spencer. We're brothers just like Cain and Abel."

\------------------------------------

The lights were off in Hotch's office, but Rossi opened the door to double check for him anyway. He wasn't surprised to discover the agent sitting on the floor with his back against the window, staring at a photo lit only by sporadic lightning strikes as a thunderstorm raged at D.C. Rossi sighed, shut the door behind him, and sat down beside Hotch. "Torturing yourself isn't going to help him."

Hotch's Adam's apple bounced. His voice could be mistaken for the sound of a man with a hand around his throat. "Why didn't I notice that the clothes were different?"

"Hotch…"

"One wound. Just one. The unsub's choices have only gotten more gruesome. I should've realized that just one injury was off-script."

"You can't—"

"I didn't even wake up." A humorless laugh bubbled out of Hotch's chest as his eyes filled. "Didn't check to see if I even got one until my alarm went off at six."

"My phone was off," Rossi admitted quietly. "I needed a full night's sleep. A full night's sleep so that I would be alert and coherent. Alert and coherent enough to make a break in the case, to find the unsub before he upped his game…" Rossi took the photo from Hotch's fingers and stared at it. "How much time do you think we have?"

"That depends," Hotch whispered, "on how long Reid can stall him."

\------------------------------------

Rain pounded Gideon's cabin. Lightning struck so close that the vibrations caused by the thunder uprooted the dust. The record player, the kitchen table, and the chessboard were still in the same place, although the pieces had all been knocked over as if by a child's swinging arm. Thick plywood covered the windows from the inside. Crushed beer cans and empty wine bottles littered the wooden floor. No hum of electricity came from the refrigerator. A lantern at Reid's feet, and another beside an unrolled sleeping bag cast a dim glow. Dozens of unplugged laptops sat on plastic tables perched over electrical generators, and dozens of pictures of Jason Gideon were attached to the fireplace. Stephen had defaced every one with a red permanent marker.

Reid carefully avoided hitting one of Gideon's small rugs when he spat blood onto the floor. Stephen, who sat in a leather chair beside the chessboard, noticed, and chuckled. "Dead men don't care how dirty their carpets are, Spencer."

"You inherited his estate," Reid said softly. "This is your house, now." He shrugged. "Seemed polite."

Stephen snorted. "Can I ask you something?"

Reid rolled his eyes. "I'm all ears."

"Do you know what it's like to be abandoned by your father? To know that he probably regretted ever having you in the first place?"

Reid considered his answer carefully. In the end he opted for honesty. "Yes."

Stephen slammed his fist down on the chessboard. "I know all about your FBI Jedi mind tricks, Spencer! False empathy won't make me want to kill you any less!"

"My parents separated when I was young," Reid explained. "I've only seen my dad once in my adult life."

Stephen swigged the last half of his latest can of beer. "But you've had father figures! My dad, Rossi, Hotch! Where's mine? Why don't I get a replacement dad for the one who was broken?" The empty aluminum can ricocheted off of the wall and rolled under the couch. "Are you really that much better than me? Am I such a worthless human being that I don't deserve a dad?"

"I—" Reid began. Stephen's fist to his mouth stuffed the words back in. Two more punches followed by vicious kick to the sternum toppled the chair. The back of Reid's skull slammed into the floor and stars burst across his vision.

"Who did he write a letter to when he quit his job, huh? You. Whose name is in this journal more than anyone else's, huh? Yours. Your name, Spencer. Not mine, yours!" Stephen picked up a wooden rocking chair and launched it across the room where it shattered against the stove. He sent a second chair sailing over Reid's head. It bounced off the fireplace before skittering across the floor in pieces. "It's not fair!" Stephen bellowed. He kicked Reid in the kidneys. "Why didn't he like me? Why, Spencer, why?"

Like a turtle on its back. That's how Reid felt. Tight ropes and the weight of the metal chair kept him pinned. He tried to shift his weight, to roll, to get away for just a minute, but he couldn't. Stephen's words turned incoherent. Whether he was just screaming vowels or Reid couldn't understand because of his new concussion, he wasn't sure. The assault continued well past the point where Stephen's face turned beet-red, even past the point where he tired himself out so much that he could only throw punches from his knees.

Reid felt himself passing out.

He didn't fight it.

\------------------------------------

Morgan tripped twice during his sprint to Garcia's office. His first sentence was little more than word salad: "Cabin scene—files Gideon—source of the source of the—the—the—"

Garcia slapped him. Right across the cheek. The sound of it was so loud that passersby stopped to check on them. "Thank you," Morgan said sincerely. "Bring up the crime scene photos from Gideon's cabin. I think I remember a pile of files on one of the chairs!"

Garcia's fingers flew. Images popped up across the screens. Barely thirty seconds passed before Morgan spotted the one he was looking for. "There!" he shouted. He clapped his hands once. "Zoom, baby girl, zoom!"

Garcia obeyed. "I can't read the name on the top one," she said, squinting, "but wait for it… there! I got the case number. I know, I know, I know, I'm cross-checking it against the cases our unsub shanghaied for the pictures and…"

Beep.

Garcia leapt to her feet and pointed at the screen. "Match!" she hollered. "The unsub didn't hack into our systems. He got the pictures from the cabin!"

Derek was already out the door.

"Thanks, Garcia," Garcia herself said in her best imitation of Morgan. "You found Reid, Garcia. I'll rally the troops while you get a warrant, Garcia. You're the best, Garcia…"

\------------------------------------

Hotch drove like he was trying to outrun a tornado. Rossi had to brace his arms against the dash, JJ gripped her seatbelt like she'd fly away if she didn't, and even Morgan clung to his seat for dear life. More potholes than road made up the path that led to Gideon's cabin in the woods. 48 hours straight of rain had turned Virginia into one giant puddle. Twice they almost got stuck in the mud. The third time they did. By that point they were only a quarter mile away, so the four agents left the car and ran as fast as they could. Wind and rain pelted down on them and thunder made the forest tremble.

Morgan saw it first. Not the cabin, the absence of it. The space where it used to be. "No," he whispered. "No, no, no!"

"Are we in the wrong place?" JJ shouted over the storm. She turned 360 degrees, scanning the trees with her hands arched over her eyes like an umbrella.

No grass grew on the patch of dirt where the cabin used to be. Deep, fresh tire tracks proved that the structure had been uprooted recently. "Maybe Stephen sold it?" Rossi wondered. "Or just moved it—relocated it? Maybe to his home address or—or maybe a family member has a plot of land? Hotch?"

Hotch moved zombie-like into the center of the empty lot. Lightning crackled through the trees and the sky spit on his face. "Call a tow truck for the car," he instructed Rossi. "Morgan, tell Garcia to dive into the Gideon family's finances. JJ, get me an address. I want to know where Stephen moved—" Hotch suddenly plastered his hands against his face. A sob of terror and grief welled up in his chest and erupted from his throat. "Hurry," he whispered.

\------------------------------------

Sniffling. Sporadic hiccups. A cotton ball dabbed the blood beneath Reid's nostrils. He was a human bruise except for his eyes. Stephen's knuckles and knees and shoes had connected with every inch of his body, but Reid's eyes remained untouched. No bruising. No swelling. No black eye. Cain wanted Abel to still be able to see…

"I didn't mean to…" Stephen's alcohol-laced breath was hot on Reid's face. "I didn't mean to be bad… Dad wouldn't like it… He hunted monsters. He hunted them for me, so my world would be better than his, and now I'm one of them. Now I'm a monster he would hunt…"

Reid parted his eyelids just wide enough to see the pale, bearded man weeping over him. How long he was unconscious this time was debatable. It wasn't long enough for Stephen to sober up, but it was long enough for the remorse to set in again. He'd rubber-banded one plastic bag full of ice to Spencer's collarbone and another around his left wrist. Vaguely Reid wondered where Stephen got the fresh blocks of ice if they were in a cabin in the middle of the woods with a refrigerator that wasn't plugged-in…

"I know it's not your fault," Stephen whispered when he noticed that Reid's eyes were open. "Intellectually, I know it isn't your fault. You didn't steal my dad from me. You didn't spend time with him because you wanted to hurt me, but Spencer…" Stephen sighed and rubbed his bloodshot eyes. "So angry. I was so angry. And imagining my dad all bloody made me happy. So happy. I don't know why, but it did. And then imagining it wasn't enough. I started drawing it, then photo-shopping it, adding details to make it more and more real. It calmed me for a while. It was like looking at my anger. It's not as painful if you can see it, you know? And then… Then I wanted to touch it. Touch the anger but I couldn't because he's dead, Dad's dead. I realized that if I was going to be angry I should be angry at someone who's still here. I read his journals. So much about you. And I realized it's you, Spencer, you're the one I hate. So I drew you. And I photo-shopped you. And then I wanted to touch your blood but I resisted it—I resisted for so long!" Stephen's jaw and shoulders loosened with personal pride. "I came up with other ways. I stabbed that rug in your apartment. I got new pictures of you to play with. I sent the pictures to the others but each time I did it, it just wasn't quite enough. Not like this. Not like this." Stephen suddenly ripped a pocketknife out of his back pocket. "Seeing you in pain, like I'm in pain, that makes me happy. I imagine the only thing that would make me happier is seeing you dead…"

Stephen plunged the knife down. It split open the rope securing Reid's left elbow. He did the same on the right. Reid's hands were freed next and his arms tumbled down limp to the floor. Once Stephen released his legs, Reid rolled onto his side and curled up into a tight ball of trembling skin. Stephen shoved the chair away and gently inserted a pillow beneath Reid's neck. And then—Reid thought he was hallucinating this at first—Stephen set the knife on the floor between them, and lay down in a parallel position.

"Spencer…" Stephen whispered. He had his father's eyes. "Save me. From myself. Kill me before I kill you. Spencer, please." Stephen nudged the knife closer. Gently he placed Reid's bruised, swollen hand around it so that he gripped it tight without actually using his muscles. "My father would want you to kill me. He'd rather I be a murder victim than a murderer. Don't let me become a bigger monster than I already am. Do it. Do it for my dad."

Chapped lips parted. "No," Reid croaked. "You want… to cause…me pain…" Oh, how his chest ached. It felt like someone was trying to squeeze his lungs into a shot glass. "You know… nothing would… cause me pain like… betraying… Gideon."

Fire returned to Stephen's eyes. "Genius," he hissed, emphasizing the 's.' "Only an idiot would pass this up. You're free. You're armed. The door is right there." Stephen pointed his thumb over his shoulder.

Reid shivered. The rain outside had cooled the air drastically. "I won't kill you," he whispered. "I want to help you. And not just because you're Gideon's son. Because that's who I am…"

Stephen snorted. "There it is. I want to help you. Another cliché from your FBI arsenal of bull crap." Stephen rolled onto his back, interlaced his fingers behind his head stared up at the ceiling. "I just told you how you could help me, Spencer. You chose not to. That was a… a mistake…" Stephen yawned.

Reid saw it the moment it happened. A switch flipped. Stephen transitioned from being fueled by the booze to being exhausted by it. Any minute now he would pass out, and then it was just a five-foot crawl to the door.

Reid suddenly coughed. Blood filled his throat. Five feet was so far…

\------------------------------------

"According to the lovely couple Stephen Gideon sold the cabin to, an 18-wheeler was supposed to deliver it to their property last month. It never arrived, which means I'm going to put an APB out on a house," Garcia reported.

"Send their address to our phones," Morgan instructed. "That truck is probably somewhere between here and their place."

"Roger that." A brief pause, and then Garcia asked, "Are you guys all right?"

"Could use some hot chocolate." From his position leaning back against a tree, Morgan could see JJ shivering beside him under an umbrella, Rossi with the driver inside the struggling tow truck, and Hotch pacing Gideon's property like a lion in a cage. "We miss Reid," Morgan admitted.

Garcia sniffed. "I love you. I'm sorry I only remember to say that when, you know, we're in Hell, but I love you."

Morgan rubbed the goose bumps on his arms and smiled down at his muddy boots. "Love you too, baby girl. Let us know—"

"I will." Garcia made a kissing sound over the phone. "Be safe."

\------------------------------------

Stephen snored like a stuffed up elephant. Reid reckoned he'd stay unconscious even if the cabin caught on fire. The ice packs Stephen applied had long since melted and reverted to room temperature. Reid clawed at the one on his wrist until it opened, and he sucked every drop of water from it. It didn't calm his growling stomach, but did, somehow, make him feel more coherent.

Reid counted the knots in the ceiling boards twice, took a deep breath, and sat up. Expecting the pain didn't make it any easier to handle. It stomped up his spine, across each rib, and sped down his veins. A sharp crescendo of agony ripped up his neck and suddenly his head felt ten times heavier. He collapsed onto his back, groaning, lying spread-eagled, exposed. Liquid squeezed between his clamped eyes and the salt stung the abrasions on his cheeks. "Get up," he whispered to himself. Reid sighed, took several breaths and then whispered, "Ok, just roll over. Try rolling over."

Lying on his stomach hurt even worse. He braced shaky elbows against the least bruised sections and inched forward. "Get to the door," he told himself. "Shatner's behind that door. Matt Smith is behind that door. Bill Nye has cupcakes…" Reid's left arm crumpled but he got his legs moving. He pushed with the right, pushed with the left, and then stretched his right hand out. A few sweeps of his fingers and he'd find a hold, then push again.

A well-deserved rest followed not only reaching the door but sitting up against the wall beside it. Sweat mixed with blood, and his skin felt simultaneously itchy and on fire. Gasping, Reid looked up at the doorknob. The logical part of him knew that it was within reach, but the part of him that was in pain—which was all of him at the moment—thought he would only reach it if he could fly. "Open the door," he told himself. "If you open the door, just an inch, you'll get a high school named after you. Open it wide enough to squeeze through and you'll win a Nobel prize…"

Success! It took Reid a good ten minutes of fighting dizziness and getting up the courage to face the pain, but he opened the door.

Instead of fresh grass and wildflowers, the stench of tar and diesel fuel flooded Reid's nostrils. He twisted his neck far enough to look outside. The rain had finally stopped but puddles dotted an enormous cement parking lot. Trucks and RV's of all shapes and sizes sat between faded yellow lines. About 50 yards away an obese man wearing a black trucker's cap waddled out of a gas station and climbed into the cab of an 18-wheeler. "Help," Reid called to him. A call that was little more than a squeak.

If he could just get to the edge of the porch. That was the next goal. From there he could run, or hide, or flag down a trucker. It was just another five feet, just five more feet…

Reid's vision swam. He ached. He was so tired… The pain in his abdomen was getting so very, very close to causing him to black out. "Five feet," Reid whispered to himself. "Just crawl five more feet and… and… Haley Hotchner will come back to life. Mom's Alzheimer's will be cured. Maeve… M-Maeve…" Reid swallowed the lump in his throat and clenched his eyes shut. When he opened them again he half-expected to be at the edge of the porch by the force of those thoughts alone. "Ok… Realistic goals…" Spencer blinked the dizziness away and laser-focused on a tiny knot of wood on the porch. "Get home. Get home so that you can be a good godfather to Henry," he told himself. "Get home so that you can take care of Mom. Get home for… for them…" Reid cursed. The sensations Dilaudid gave him popped into his mind and refused to be shooed away. "No, no," he hissed. "No Dilaudid. Think of Mom and Henry… Think of Hotch and Morgan… Think of—"

Hands clamped around his ankles and pulled. In no condition to put up a fight beyond weak kicks, Reid went limp as Stephen dragged him back into the house. Wind caused by the slammed door parted his hair. "You son of a bitch!" Stephen shouted. "I'm not done with you yet, you hear me? I'm not done with you!"

\------------------------------------

Morgan, Rossi, and Hotch stampeded into JJ's office when she summoned them. "911 call came in 10 minutes ago," she announced, and clicked a button on her computer. An operator asked what the emergency was, and then a man with a smoker's cough began to speak.

Might just be a couple of boys horsing around but one of 'em looked per-kuel-yeer. Like he was sick or somethin'. The other grabbed 'em real rough, right? Not playin' rough but 'rough' rough. Slammed the door before I could get a proper looksee. The operator asked for the location and the man gave the address. It's a truck stop locals call The Wolf. But they weren't in no truck. Well, they were on a truck, but they were in this cabin—

If the members of the BAU team were cartoon characters, they'd have clouds of dust in their wake as they sprinted out the door.

\------------------------------------

Only the adrenaline of a psychopath could've fueled Stephen to hang Reid by his wrists like a dead cow. One rope around his wrists, another tossed over the ceiling rafters, both tied together, and Stephen raised Reid into the air, making his body the largest target it could possibly be. Although Reid could touch the floor with his tiptoes, it was slightly less painful just to hang limp and let his numb wrists support all of his weight. Less painful until he couldn't breathe, and then he had to lift himself up to allow his lungs to expand properly. The alcohol was gone from Stephen's system but so was his remorse. When Reid started to pass out he socked him in the abdomen. Certain that Reid was wide awake, and had his full attention, Stephen began to speak as he rummaged through boxes and bags and baskets for God-knows-what.

"I like you, Spencer," he said. "We could've been friends in another life. Maybe even actual brothers. Playing chess, bird-watching with Dad, acting out Hardy Boys novels…"

"Stephen." Reid measured the other man's body language and knew it was time for a new tactic. "They're going to find me. Hotch, Morgan, and the others are the best in the world. You could drop this cabin in the ocean, and they'd still find it." Stephen tapped his finger against his chin as if he was actually considering the ocean option. "And when they do, when they see me like this, it won't matter that you're Jason Gideon's son. They won't give a damn about your daddy-didn't-love-me sob story. When they see what you've done to me, they will kill you."

"So much for FBI protocol, huh?" Stephen murmured.

"You of all people should know that there's a line," Reid whispered. "There's a point where family trumps everything else. It's more important than your job, your vows, your sanity, your freedom… What you're doing to me is because of your family. What they'll do will be for theirs… For me."

"You're trying to scare me into letting you go."

"I'm trying to make you understand that you need to turn yourself in," Reid begged. "Every minute I'm missing makes it that much more likely they'll shoot you on sight."

"Yeah. Maybe that'll happen," Stephen agreed. "Maybe Rossi will do it. Maybe Hotch will. Bet it'll eat them up. No matter what I've done, it'll eat them alive."

"You're expecting them. You want them to find you." Realization dawned. Reid hung his head. "You couldn't hurt me by getting me to kill you, so you're going to hurt them the same way."

"I want Hotch and Rossi to suffer, too. Dad chose them over me as well. That's why they got the pictures. And you, Spencer, you could've saved them from that by killing me when you had the chance. Only way you can kill me now is to convince me to off myself." Stephen whipped a pistol out of a cabinet and held it against his temple.

"Don't—" Reid gasped.

Stephen chuckled. "You're not even going to try to do that, are you? You'd rather I die at their hands."

"I'd prefer that nobody die," Reid wheezed. His left leg buckled beneath him and it took extra focus for his right to keep him suspended long enough for oxygen to reduce the dizziness. "Not me. Not them. Not you." He used the most volume he could muster and said, "Not your dad."

"They'll shoot me in the head, won't they?" Stephen wondered out loud. "They'll make it quick, right? I want it quick. If I want anything, I want that. And you know what, Spencer?" Reid's stomach clenched. He felt something in the air shift. Some invisible mood in the room changed. "I think you're right. I think they're more likely to kill me fast if they see how bad of shape you're in."

Reid heard footsteps. His eyes went to the door but Stephen, who was cocking the gun, didn't notice. Reid's heart raced. He just had to stall a little longer. Minutes. Seconds, maybe. "Stephen—"

The gun clicked. Stephen raised it. Stephen pointed it. His finger twitched against the trigger.

A boot kicked in the door. Both Spencer and Stephen were expecting a male voice to shout, "FBI," and both were shocked when a woman yelled, "Police!"

"No!" Stephen growled at the nameless officers crowded in the doorframe. "Not you! It's not supposed to be you!"

"Put the gun down!" the female captain hollered. "Now or we'll shoot! Now!"

Stephen sighed. Sincere tears overflowed from his eyes. "If I can't get the death I want," he declared, eyes locked with Reid's, "I'll still have yours!"

\------------------------------------

Hotch had just parked the SUV beside the police cruisers when the shots rang out. "God, no," he whispered. His legs were made of Jell-O but they carried him quickly to the cabin, half a step behind Morgan with Rossi and JJ behind him. Two police officers stepped aside. A third was already on his phone and asking for an ambulance. Another crouched down beside Stephen who lay on his back with three bullet holes in his chest. He didn't move.

Neither did Reid. Hotch registered white eyelids, limp limbs, bruised skin, and a fresh hole in his shirt. He didn't notice when his own gun slid out of his hand and clattered across the floor.

Time slowed.

Hotch pressed his hand against the blood gushing from Reid's stomach. Rossi cleared the floor, JJ grabbed a blanket, and Morgan cut the rope. Like the dozens of times he'd carried his sleeping son from the car to his bed, Hotch hooked one arm under Reid's knees and the other behind his back, cradling and gently lowering him to the ground. He cushioned the younger man's shoulders against his inner thigh, kept his right arm behind his neck, and moved his left so that JJ could apply pressure to the wound. Morgan knelt on Reid's opposite side and freed his hands from the ropes.

"Reid?" When Hotch spoke again his voice broke on the second syllable. "Spencer?"

Morgan pressed a trembling finger against Reid's neck. "It's there but it's faint," he reported.

Hotch licked his lips, then bit down hard on the lower one. Palm cupping Reid's cheek, thumb rubbing the stubble between his nose and cheekbone, Hotch leaned over and held his ear above the young doctor's white lips. After holding his own breath for nearly ten seconds, he felt the faintest exhale tickle his skin.

An equally faint voice whispered, "I tried to save him…"

Hotch's chest hitched. "Reid?"

"H-Hotch…?"

JJ squeaked. Both of her hands flew to her mouth. When Hotch raised his head, she darted in and kissed Reid's furrowed brow. Rossi gripped Hotch's shoulder like it was a life preserver and Morgan held Reid's hand in both of his like it was a fragile newborn bird.

"Failed," Reid murmured. "Failed Gideon…" His eyes stayed shut and his frown deepened.

"Open your eyes," Hotch commanded. He gave Reid a gentle shake. "Open your eyes and look at me, Reid."

Reid obeyed the first half of Hotch's order. The sight of the red soaking through the blanket caught his attention. "That's why he didn't touch my eyes…"

"What? Reid, what do you mean?" Morgan urged.

"He—He hurt me. Hurt all of me except my eyes… This is what he wanted me to see. He wanted me to see myself die."

Hotch shuddered. He folded his upper body around Reid as if he could hide him from death itself. "I said look at me, Reid!" Reid blinked. It was slow, and bumpy. Pupils dilated and un-dilated, back and forth again. Sirens wailed in the distance. "You," Hotch said, "are not going to die. Do you hear me, son? You're not going to die."

Reid didn't actually repeat the word "son," but his mouth moved like he was saying it. He coughed. His body endured a painful spasm. Morgan cradled Reid's hand beneath his chin and Hotch hugged him closer. Suddenly Reid's eyes opened wider as if he saw something about to fall on Hotch's head. "No," he whispered, "no, not yet…"

Every muscle in Hotch's body went taunt. "Reid?"

"Now I can't see. I—I can't see you." Reid squinted. His eyes darted in every direction.

"I'm here. I'm right here with you. We all are," Hotch told him. Reid's body seemed to shrink in his arms, to deflate like a balloon.

"Hotch…"

"Just keep—" Hotch lost his voice and had to swallow three times to recover it. "Just stay awake. Reid? I've got you. Stay awake. Stay with us."

No matter how many times Hotch repeated the order, Reid could no longer hear him.

\------------------------------------

How many fist-sized containers of cherry Jell-O could Derek Morgan fit into a cooler? 164. Jell-O transporter was the cooler's original purpose. Its second was a seat. So many people crowded into the waiting area outside Reid's hospital room that all of the chairs were taken. Henry had to sit on his mom's lap and Jack on his dad's. "Only one of you to start off with," a nurse warned the group.

Morgan walked slowly into the room with a dozen Jell-O cups cradled in his arm like a bouquet of flowers. The curtains were closed, and every light was out but a dim lamp on Reid's bedside table. Between the angle of the shadows, Reid's ghost-white skin, and the way his cheekbones had sharpened after so many days taking in so few calories, the young doctor seemed to have aged by 20 years. Morgan went to brush wayward bangs off of his friend's eyelids but hesitated when a flash flood of tears briefly blinded him. He wiped his eyes, then reached out again. The sleeping man stirred when Morgan's sleeve accidentally bumped the cannula in his nose.

"…hide the blueberries in the toaster," Reid mumbled. He winced. He swallowed. White sheets and blankets wiggled as he stretched his limbs for the first time since his surgery. Morgan piled the cups on a tray and sat on the side of the bed at Reid's waist, wanting his friend to see his face when he woke up instead of a figure towering over him. Minutes passed. Reid stilled again, and eventually the frown relaxed and went flat. Certain that his friend had passed out again, and also certain that he needed to rest, Morgan started to leave. Before he stood up, cold fingers touched his wrist.

"Reid?" Morgan clasped his friend's hand. He resisted the urge to squeeze. Although the swelling had gone down, and the stitches were sewn tight, the majority of Reid's body was still bruised. "Reid, it's Morgan. Can you hear me?"

A pink tongue licked dry lips. "Weird dream," Reid croaked. Both corners of his lips twitched with a smile. "That sombrero was so… bossy." Morgan chuckled. Reid gathered his strength and pried his eyes open. "Did I get shot?"

"You're ok now, kid. Full recovery. Back to abnormal in no time."

Reid shivered. Morgan grabbed another blanket and draped it across him. "What do you need?" Morgan asked. "Are you thirsty? Hungry? I brought Jell-O. Garcia downloaded your favorite "Stargate" episodes."

"My mom," Reid whispered. "I should talk to her." Stork-thin arms pushed against the mattress.

Morgan flinched when his hands against Reid's chest caused the young agent pain. "Kid, relax. You have a skull fracture, internal bleeding, a sprained ankle, two ribs are cracked, and your left wrist is broken. Reid, you have to rest."

Reid's eyes widened as Morgan listed his injuries. "Is he dead? Stephen?" Morgan nodded. "He was so angry," Reid whispered. "So… hurt." A lazy smile sprouted. "You found me."

"Of course we found you." Morgan smiled back. "Sorry it wasn't sooner. Sorry it ever happened in the first place. I should've stayed with you…" Morgan graced his hands over Reid's and glared at the bruises on them. Reid's fingers tightened around his. "Seriously, kid. What do you need? You just woke up from a nightmare. What do you need right now more than anything?"

"More than you and Jell-O?" Faces darted through Spencer's mind. Stephen had the right idea about how important father figures were, Reid realized. And what son doesn't need a father after a nightmare? "Is Hotch here?" Reid whispered.

Reid didn't mean to fall asleep after Morgan left the room. He closed his eyes for just a second, and the next thing he knew Hotch was sitting at his bedside, snoring softly, with his hand around Reid's wrist, finger on the pulse point. Reid wiggled in Hotch's grasp, interlacing their fingers and squeezing as hard as he could, which was just barely tight enough to rouse Hotch from his nap.

"Hey." Hotch smiled with his lips, and then grinned wide with every tooth. "Happy to see you."

"You, too," Reid said. He started to speak but Hotch sprung forward and wrapped him in a tight hug—hands beneath his neck and spine, nose in his shoulder.

"So happy," Hotch whispered. He sat on the edge of the bed and took a good long look at his young friend. "Spencer, I'm so sorry—"

Reid shook his head and dismissed the words with a wave. "It's ok."

"It's not."

"It is."

"It's not because I haven't told you…" Hotch looked at everything else in the room except for Spencer's eyes. "I want you to know something."

Reid cocked an eyebrow. "What?"

"When we were in my office, and I told you that Gideon was proud of you, I should've said that I am, too." Hotch took a deep breath, and then cupped Reid's pale cheek with a calloused hand. "Proud like a father of his son," he whispered.

Reid smiled back. "Love you, too, Hotch."

**The End ******


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